The 21-year-old woman was hospitalized in stable condition after the Thursday night attack near West 116th Street and Broadway.
NEW YORK — A 21-year-old member of the Barnard College community was hospitalized after being slashed near a residence hall in Manhattan on Thursday night, according to police and college communications, as investigators continued searching for the person responsible.
New York City police responded shortly after 8 p.m. Nov. 12 to a reported assault near Barnard College and Columbia University in Morningside Heights. Officers found the woman with a laceration behind her ear, according to information the NYPD provided to People. She was taken to a nearby hospital in stable condition. Her name has not been publicly released.
The assault occurred outside 600 West 116th St., a Barnard residence hall near Broadway, according to the Columbia Daily Spectator. Barnard describes the building as a suite-style residence hall occupied primarily by upperclass students, along with some private and faculty tenants. College officials confirmed that the injured woman was a member of the Barnard community, although publicly available information did not clearly establish whether she was a student.
Students at Barnard and neighboring Columbia University received safety alerts after the assault. Barnard’s Community Accountability, Response, and Emergency Services department told students that the assailant fled toward Broadway and then headed north, according to the Spectator.
A separate alert sent to Columbia students included a physical description of a person being sought after the attack. People reported that the NYPD did not include that description in the information it provided to the publication and did not confirm whether investigators were officially seeking a person matching it. Because of that discrepancy, authorities had not publicly established the description as an NYPD identification as of Friday.
Barnard student Eva Kates told the Spectator that she encountered a large police presence while walking along West 116th Street after the assault. She said she initially thought officers were responding to an incident at a nearby business before noticing the injured woman with police. The witness account described the aftermath of the attack but did not establish how or why it began.
College officials later circulated an image captured by a security camera as part of their safety communication, according to the Spectator. Barnard said the NYPD was investigating. The college directed media inquiries about the case to police when contacted by People on Friday.
No motive had been publicly identified as of Nov. 13, and authorities had not announced an arrest. Available police information did not indicate that the woman knew her attacker or explain what led to the assault. Reports characterizing the attack as random had not been accompanied by a publicly released police finding establishing a motive.
The incident remained under investigation Friday, with the injured woman most recently reported in stable condition. Police had not publicly identified a suspect or announced charges in connection with the assault.